Flag of the Region

The Regional Council of Languedoc-Roussillon changed the
Region's logo and flag in 2004, following the change in the political
majority. The flag exists in two versions (according to photos taken
by myself on 6 December 2006):
- red with the "seven suns", as hoisted over the building of the
Regional Council at Montpellier;
- red with the full logo, that is the "seven suns" flanked by the
writing "la Région" (white) / "Languedoc" (yellow) /
"Roussillon" (yellow), as hoisted in front Lycée Joffre, managed at Montpellier, by the Regional Council. On this particular flag, the three words are less spaced than on the official logo.

The "seven suns" alludes to Septimania, the name given to the area in
the Roman period. This name, based on sept, "seven", comes either
from the 7th Roman Legion whose veterans are said to have settled in
the region, or, more probably, from the seven towns of Elne, Agde,
Narbonne, Lodève, Béziers, Maguelone and Nîmes.

The first logo of the Region, adopted in June 2004, included the writing "Vivre en Septimanie" (To live in Septimania), as a first step towards a change of the name of the region to "Septimanie" by the controversial
President of the Region, Georges Frêche. As an historian, Frêche claimed that the Region, lacking any historical identity (which is true), needed a "main identitary element unifying the Occitan and
Catalan components of the Region".

Frêche's proposal of changing the name of the Region caused locally a great fuss; the French Catalans claimed that their specific identity, represented by "Roussillon" would be dropped, while other noted that the Department of Lozère was not part of Septimania. The proposal of change was eventually withdrawn in October 2005. However, the "seven suns" symbol remained, without the "Vivre en Septimanie" motto, as
well as the "unification between the Occitan and Catalan components",
symbolized by the flags hoisted over the building of the Regional
Council at Montpellier, from left to right: European Union, France, Region Languedoc-Roussillon, Occitania and Catalonia.